Pragmatix Tapped To Solve BusinessWeek’s
Recurring Problem Compiling Information for Print Orders
Lowering Postage, Employee and Processing Costs

ELMSFORD (5/7/03) – BusinessWeek recently tapped Pragmatix, an innovative technology company, to design a Web-based system to manage and control the weekly print order process, resulting in substantial savings in postage, employee and processing costs.

The print order process was previously a weekly, last-minute rush of phone, e-mail, and fax requests, with exposure to clerical and processing errors, poor customer satisfaction and manual intervention.
Newsstand, non-subscriber and special copy requests were manually processed and individually handled and mailed amid rising postage and special-handling costs. The process for collecting weekly data was
time consuming and expensive, requiring the involvement of nearly a dozen people, resulting in poor record-keeping for department charge back costs.

Pragmatix quickly stepped in, fully understood the problem and harnessed their knowledge to create a solution that could receive inputs from many sources, including world-wide managers electronically
feeding from internal systems, and electronically filed uploads from external vendors. “We were able to understand the magazine’s intricate print order process and devise an innovative solution that met their
needs,” said William Abram, president of Pragmatix.

In addition, the Pragmatix solution worked with, and improved, the flow of information to fulfillment service bureaus and printers. Primary outputs were print orders sent to production plants and non-subscriber
labels, sent as electronic files to those plants to be merged into the print run.

The Pragmatix solution significantly reduced postage costs, reduced the employee headcount by one person and reduced average request processing time from 20 minutes to under five minutes.

“Pragmatix was quickly able to understand and improve our Print Order process,” said Thomas Masterson, VP Worldwide Circulation Director for BusinessWeek . “The Pragmatix solution allowed us to cut our staff
by one full time equivalent, along with reducing the work load 20% by creating enormous efficiency, and eliminating the bottlenecks and weekly 'scrambles’ we used to encounter. In addition, we uncovered
additional savings within the company.”

Pragmatix also created a secure, Web-based self-service application to collect requestor name, version and quantity, charge-back account information, one-time and repeating special requests, and recipient
and shipping detail.

By using the Pragmatix solution, BusinessWeek now delivers an up-to-the-minute snapshot of the weekly print order, total copies to manufacturing department and relevant print facilities, recipient information to service bureau/distribution coordinator, charge back information to finance department, customized reports for all authorized end users of the system and alerts for relevant users to input timely data and make alternative selections for invalid requests.

For more information about the BusinessWeek solution, go to www.pragmatix.com or contact Bill Abram at 914-345-9444.

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